The metro to the bus, the bus to the taxi.
It was his first day of the dead in Mexico, and in the crowded subway sitting
beside me he would push his fingers into his cheeks to chew the soft tissue inside his mouth, 
I could feel his heart pounding.

Where the concrete became dust and we stood waiting on the dirt path.
Hundreds of Mexicans walking to celebrate the dead and I was one of them.
I stood there knowing I was close to death, 

I had gone to the hospital twice that week, when nurses walked by me their eyes met mine with their brows frowned in pity. I was dying and they knew and I knew, but I continued. 
This memory remains in Mixquic,
surrounded by bones 
and the cempasúchiles 
and the sound of candles burning in the night.